Towards an online knowledge management system for reactive maintenance projects

Ali, KN

Abstract

In the UK, building maintenance makes up more than 50% of total
construction output while reactive maintenance covers two thirds of the
overall building maintenance projects. It was therefore found not surprisingly
that reactive maintenance work receives the most complaints and gives more
negative impacts on business activities in terms of time, cost, and the health
and safety of the users. As this type of maintenance work is mostly carried
out by firms with less than 20 employees, which constitutes 84% of the
industry, reactive maintenance is hence, the major focus of this study. The
aim of the research is to demonstrate how inexpensive IT and
communication tools can lead to enhanced effectiveness and efficiency in the
delivery of minor construction projects. Process analysis was carried out to
provide valuable insights into the existing business process of reactive
maintenance and also the information and communication technology that is
being used by the parties involved in the process. It unearthed problems that
impede the process in terms of time, cost, quality of work and the health and
safety of the users. These problems can be encapsulated as poor
communications between different parties, lack of knowledge sharing and
poor quality of information, which often leads to longer time taken to fix a
problem and incurs higher cost. A prototype online knowledge management
system called "MoPMIT". MoPMIT (More Productive Minor Construction
Projects through Information Technology) was developed based on these
problems and the improvements required which the main idea is to bring all
parties onto the online system so that they can share the necessary project
information for better management of knowledge. The system allows them to
communicate and share the information available to them via a common
interface with pre-allocated password access as a control mechanism that
restricts each user to its role. System evaluation was conducted among
potential MoPMIT users and generally the results were positive. They were
of the view that this system would lead to better management of knowledge,
improve communication and better sharing between all parties.

Citation

Ali, K. Towards an online knowledge management system for reactive maintenance projects. (Thesis). University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Deposit Date: Aug 1, 2011
• Publicly Available Date: Aug 1, 2011
• Award Date: Jan 1, 2004